Export steam is often produced from catalytic steam-hydrocarbon reforming processes to recover heat that would otherwise be discharged to the atmosphere and thereby wasted. However as the amount of export steam produced is increased beyond a threshold limit, the energy efficiency of the overall catalytic steam-hydrocarbon reforming process is degraded. As more export steam is produced, conventional steam-hydrocarbon reforming processes must combust more fuel and let down high level heat that would otherwise heat combustion air and other process streams for low level heating of water for making the export steam. This mismatch in heat source and heat sink results in combustion of additional fuel and increases the amount of combustion product gas (flue gas) formed and thereby increases the heat loss to the environment via the flue gas losses.
Industry desires to improve the energy efficiency of catalytic steam-hydrocarbon reforming processes when increasing the amount of export steam produced.